is an internationally respected leading ethno-ecologist who works in coupled human environmental systems. His current research includes investigation of early warning signals of global change, trans-boundary water governance, landscape restoration, ecosystem services and their resilience, agriculture, and integrative conservation. Dr Xu leads the World Agroforestry Centre's East and Central Asia regional programme.

Recurrent floods have become a major problem in the transboundary Lower Mono River catchment of Togo and Benin, causing more damage and loss of life than any other disaster in the area. The level of understanding about floods and their management can be as diverse as the groups within the communities and thus can present a variety of perspectives. People tend to perceive flood risk and management differently due to their proximity to flood-prone areas and their level of vulnerability as well as their capacity to adapt. Therefore, this study explores the specific perspectives of local communities and experts on floods in the transboundary Mono catchment, which can help to inform better adaptation strategies according to the contexts of each community. We conducted series of focus groups discussions (FGDs) using the Actors, Resources, Dynamics, and Interactions (ARDI) framework to develop mental models of flood management. This approach allowed us to identify the causes and impact of flooding in the area, and to describe the actors and effects of flood events on the main natural resources as well as the dynamics and interactions that drive change and influence flood management in the study area. The results indicate that the perceptions of local communities and experts show both similarities and differences. These differences include (1) perceptions of relevant direct actors, (2) perceptions of resources at stake, and (3) actor-specific resource utilization. Considering these dissimilar views between expert and local community knowledge systems appears to be an important contributing factor to improving flood mitigation efforts in the catchment. Adapting risk communication and measures taken for flood management in accordance with the perceptions of affected communities could greatly increase success, with positive long-term effects for the involved institutions and communities regarding mutual trust-building.

Climate change is likely to have significant impacts on the forestry sector in New Zealand. However, an understanding of how forest growers are reducing their risks from climate change impacts is still in its infancy. This paper applies the protection motivation theory to identify socio-psychological factors influencing forest growers’ adaptation to climate change. This study presents the survey results from 60 forest growers who have the combined responsibility for managing more than 70% of New Zealand’s plantation forests. We investigated whether their perceived response efficacy, self-efficacy and their understanding of response costs are predictors of their protective or adaptive measures. Based on our survey, risk reduction and risk spreading are the two types of protective measure frequently reported by the respondents to deal with climate risks. Consistent with the protection motivation theory, our findings show that respondents who are more likely to implement protective or adaptive measures if they perceive the threat severity to be high have high self-efficacy and resource efficacy, and exhibit low maladaptive responses such as evading and postponing behaviours. Furthermore, our findings also suggest that there is a low self-efficacy belief with strong maladaptive behaviour among the respondents that negatively influence their motivation to implement adaptation measures. This result provides guidance to policy makers, researchers and forest companies on how to make climate change adaptation efforts effective by considering the forest growers motivation to adapt to climate change.

To provide the forest industry with a better understanding of alternatives to simulate future adaptation pathways under evolving climatic and socio-economic uncertainty, we review the literature on how adaptation decisions are modelled in the context of plantation forests. This review leads to the conclusion that the representation of adaptation behaviour and decision-making remain very limited in most of the agent-based models in the forestry sector. Moreover, theoretical frameworks used to understand the adaptation behaviour of forest owners are also lacking. In this paper, we propose the application of protection motivation theory (PMT) as a framework to understand the motivation of forest owners to reduce the negative impacts of climate change on their forest plantations. Furthermore, the use of PMT allows factors affecting the maladaptive behaviour of forest owners to be examined. A survey of New Zealand foresters showed that less than 10% of smallholder forest owners adopted adaptation strategies. This result highlights the importance of addressing the research question “what motivates forest owners to take risk reduction measures?” Exploring this question is crucial to the future success of the New Zealand forestry sector and we suggest that it can be addressed by using PMT. This paper proposes a conceptual framework for an agent-based model as an alternative to simulating adaptation pathways for forest plantations in New Zealand.